In this episode of The Ryan Leak Podcast, we’re going behind the scenes of my upcoming book—specifically, the story of the book cover. Sounds simple, right? Not even close. This episode is about what it really means to stop settling for “good enough” and start living with Big League standards. I share how a challenge from a friend, an introduction to a world-class designer, and one unforgettable sentence—“Yeah, it’s called the Big Leagues”—completely shifted my perspective on excellence.We’ll talk about impatience, the temptation to settle, and why you need to surround yourself with people who push you to grow. If you’ve ever coasted, played it safe, or convinced yourself something was “fine,” this one’s for you. It’s not about being the best—it’s about giving your best. Every time.🔥 Order Ryan’s new book, How to Work With Complicated People, releasing April 15, on Amazon today.📲 Want more weekly encouragement from Ryan? Text “Podcast” to 469-809-1201 to get his weekly inspiring text.
Chapter 1: What is the Ryan Leak Podcast about?
Welcome to the Ryan Leak Podcast, where we keep things short and sweet and practical for you. Just try to give you a little small nugget of inspiration for your week. I've got a new book coming out April 15th called How to Work with Complicated People. And I would love for you to pre-order that on Amazon. And as we have been talking about the book a lot lately...
Chapter 2: What inspired the book cover for 'How to Work with Complicated People'?
I've had a lot of people compliment specifically the book cover. Now on today's episode, I want to give you a little bit of the behind the scenes of how the book cover came to be. If you have not seen this book cover, you can go to ryanleek.com slash complicated, or you can see it on any one of my social media platforms. Nevertheless, writing a book is hard enough, but choosing a book cover is
Chapter 3: Why is choosing a book cover more complicated than it seems?
Well, it shouldn't be complicated, right? I know it's easy to think. A cover? Like, Ryan, it's just a book cover. It's not that big of a deal, but... When you have poured a couple of years of your life into writing a book, you don't want to wrap it in something that's just good enough. And the truth is, I almost settled.
Chapter 4: How can settling for 'good enough' hold you back?
I got some solid cover options that could have gotten the job done, no question about it, but they were safe. They were clean. But if I'm honest, something just didn't sit right. I could tell that I was settling for good enough. Have you ever been there? That place where you know something could be better, but you convince yourself that it's fine, just as it is. It'll work. It gets the job done.
You tell yourself, no one will notice. But the only problem is, You notice. Deep down, you know you've got more in the tank. You're just tired. You're impatient. Or afraid to admit that good enough is really just a dressed up version of not my best. I've been there. And let me tell you, settling is sneaky. It wears this disguise of practicality, but really, it's just fearing a different outfit.
Chapter 5: Who challenged Ryan to raise his standards?
But I have to say this. Thank God for those friends who won't let you settle. I sent my cover options to a bunch of friends and got some mild feedback. But then I had one friend, Whitney. She challenged me. She said, these are all crap, Ryan. I said, Whitney, you think everything is crap? We've talked about this several times. She said, you're right. However, you need something like this.
And then she sends me a website of a guy named Rodrigo. His website absolutely blew me away. it was immediately evident that Rodrigo and his team were world class. I dug into it more and saw that he had worked on Dr. Peter Atiyah's book, Outlived, The Science and Art of Longevity, which is one of the number one books in the world. Ironically, some of my friends actually work with Dr. Peter Atiyah.
And so I gave them a call to ask about Rodrigo. Her name is Lacey, and she's actually been on the previous format of this very podcast. And so she's a really good friend of mine, and she gave him and his team a raving review. She said, hey, Rodrigo's the best. And I said, okay, okay, okay. And then, of course, I had to ask the question. We all want to know when we're shopping.
Chapter 6: What did Ryan learn from working with designer Rodrigo?
How much are we talking? What kind of dollars and cents are we talking about here? And Lacey, she gives me the ballpark. of what their fee would be. And my response was, for a book cover? Like, like, like, like, like, for a book cover? This is what we want for a book cover? Wow. And in that moment, that's when my friend Lacey hit me with a line I will never forget.
She said, yeah, it's called the big leagues. I said, ooh. Lacey, Lacey, Lacey, why'd you have to come at me like that on a Tuesday? That was unnecessary. Talking about some, yeah, it's called the big league. She knows me too well. She knows I'm competitive. And I couldn't get the phrase out of my head. I said, get me on the phone with Rodrigo. I want to talk to this guy.
The next day, I got to meet with Rodrigo, and within minutes, I understood why he and his team are worth every penny. Oh, yeah, yeah, they don't mess around. In that moment, I realized, oh, so this, this is what the big leagues feels like. You see, it's not about being the best. It's about giving your best. It's about refusing to settle.
Chapter 7: How can we avoid settling in our personal and professional lives?
And after working with Rodrigo's team for nearly a year, I look back and think, man, we have come a very long way when it comes to this book cover. And the reason is simple. We raised the standard. We decided not to play small. You've probably heard the phrase, don't despise small beginnings. That's real. But here's what's also very real. Some people start small and they stay small.
Chapter 8: What does it mean to play in the 'big leagues'?
Not because they have to, but because they settle. We use phrases like, this is good enough, or nobody will notice. But playing in the big leagues requires you to challenge that mindset. This episode is an invitation to graduation. Where in your life are you tempted to settle? Maybe you've been coasting at work, just doing enough to get by.
Maybe you've stopped investing in your relationships because things are fine. Or maybe you've got a dream or an idea that you've been sitting on for years, afraid to invest in it because it just costs too much. And the cost might be in your time, it might be in your money, or the cost might indeed be in your energy. And you just go, I just don't have it right now.
I just don't want you to take the easy route. I want you to go where the expectations are high. I want you to go where the demands are high. I want you to go where the pressure is on to perform, to grow, to develop. You need to be around people in places that push you, people who won't let you stay the same.
Jim Rohn, motivational speaker, he once said, don't wish it were easier, wish you were better. That quote hits hard because it reminds us that growth comes from pressure, from putting ourselves in environments that challenge us to rise higher. The big leagues is about challenging yourself to do things that scare you a little, things that make you grow. And here's the thing about growth.
It doesn't happen in the easy crowd. You don't get better by surrounding yourself with people who let you coast. If you're setting goals, don't just set goals for the sake of checking them off. Set goals that force you to become someone better in the process. The kind of goals that require you to step up and learn new skills and read more and learn more and put in the reps.
If your goals don't scare you a little bit, they're not stretching you enough. If you want to play in the big leagues, you've got to hold yourself to a higher standard. And that means leveling up your excellence, even when no one is watching. Here's what I want you to do this week. First, I want you to start by identifying just one area where you know that you've been settling.
And then ask, what would it look like for me to give my best here? I want you to get some feedback from someone you trust. Maybe it's investing in better tools, resources, or people. I want you to take one bold step that stretches you because excellence isn't a destination. It's a habit.
When you start giving your best in the small things, you'll find yourself operating in the big leagues without even knowing it. And you'll never want to go back. When it came time to print the book, the design for the book on how to work with complicated people, we were told, was a little too complicated to print in a way that books are normally printed.
Therefore, the colors we had chosen had to be a little more dull. It was still a good cover, and people liked it. And I got to that good enough place again. And I'll be honest, it really was good enough. It was still like, man, Rodrigo did this thing. It's still a really great cover, but... It's not quite where I want it to be, but it really is good enough. Like, we're fine.
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